Fri., 11:29 pm: McNally 'offer' part of Oakhill records turned over

August 15, 2014

COMING SATURDAY: Documents filed in the Oakhill Renaissance Place political corruption case show defense attorneys have been given hundreds of hours of recorded telephone calls, other audio clips and a fax "of confidential offer'' from Youngstown Mayor John McNally relating to the county's purchase of the former South Side Hospital.

Part of the "more than 100 gigabytes of evidence'' prosecutors have turned over includes the faxed offer from McNally, one of three defendants so far in the case, to the Cleveland law firm of Ulmer and Berne, which represented Cafaro Co. subsidiary Ohio Valley Mall in a failed 2006 in a lawsuit it filed to block the move of the county's Department of Job and Family Services from the Cafaro Co.-owned Garland Plaza to Oakhill.

Among the charges against McNally is an accusation that while a Mahoning County commissioner, he provided the offer to an attorney with Ulmer and Berne -- information that also was contained in a bill of particulars filed in the case in June -- that commissioners made to a bankruptcy trustee to buy Oakill.

A bill of particulars provides details to support charges contained in an indictment.

Also charged in the 67-page, 83-count indictment, the result of a joint Ohio Attorney General's Office / Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office investigation into Mahoning County's 2006 purchase of Oakill are Mahoning County Auditor Michael Sciortino and attorney Martin Yavorick.

All three are accused of conspiring to stop the move of the county's Department of Job and Family Services from the Cafaro Co.-owned Garland Plaza into Oakhill. Of the charges against the three, they all face one or multiple charges of engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, conspiracy, bribery, tampering with records and money laundering.

They say they are innocent.

Read more details about the records in the Saturday Tribune Chronicle.